


Abide, Abound

by Elleth



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Character Study, Developing Relationship, F/F, Femslash, Metaphysics, Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-26
Updated: 2015-04-26
Packaged: 2018-03-24 17:40:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3777559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elleth/pseuds/Elleth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five years after the Battle of the Five Armies, Tauriel continues to struggle with healing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Abide, Abound

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LittleRaven](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleRaven/gifts).



> A mixture of book-verse and movieverse. For one thing, I don’t subscribe to the parts of movie canon that killed off the wives of Thranduil and Bard, and I am quite confused by the whole issue of Aragorn’s age in movieverse, so while the events may match movieverse in several respects, the timeline is bookverse, and Arwen, at this point living in Lothlórien, still has five years until she even meets Aragorn for the first time. I've also taken some liberties with the LaCE, but that's just a minor thing.
> 
> I hope this does justice to your request for something character-motivated. Thank you for giving me the chance to explore these two!

The erstwhile desolation around Erebor is covered in young willows - one for every fallen bedded to rest in the grave-glade in Mirkwood - that stand as high as Tauriel herself, and the ground is carpeted in water-logged moss and grass waving in the autumn wind. Ravenhill juts up in the distance, dark against the clouds, and in Dale restored the bells are ringing a solemn dirge. The fifth time since the battle, and still she cannot bring herself to step over the border and onto the battlefield, kneeling at its edge instead and coiling a hand into the new growth, never caring that water soaks into her breeches and she will be shivering before long. 

“If you would go further,” Maltheniel says quietly behind her, stepping away from King Bard and Queen Svana who have accompanied them to likewise pay their respects, “go. I do not need you to guard me here.” Her warm fingers come to rest in the center of Tauriel’s back, almost a mother’s concerned touch. 

Tauriel wordlessly shakes her head, uncouth an answer though that is to her own Queen. Thranduil, if he were not roaming somewhere between the willows, would disapprove, she knows. Their relationship has cooled somewhat - not, Maltheniel has said countless times with unerring patience, because he has not forgiven her insubordination during the battle, for that is not a trait unknown in Thranduil’s own family, but because her loss of Kíli and the wounds it has torn are a reminder of his own losses that he refuses to admit aloud, carried from Dagorlad over three-thousand years to this very battlefield. 

The knowledge that Thranduil has himself been coping ill makes it hard to blame him for his harsh manner, his constant rebuffs when she attempts to do her work - and does it well, too, facing her king’s adversity even after she has let go of her desire for vengeance. The new Mirkwood guard - comprised of many of those grieving their losses in the Five Armies - have done likewise, little by little, to begin their healing rather than fuel their duty by revenge alone. Tauriel is doubly grateful for Maltheniel’s interference, steering her husband to some gentler counsel with a few choice words, a soft hand soothing on his cheek, as often as she is able. Ultimately, though, it changes little.

And amid her personal turmoil, Mirkwood, for a reprieve she cannot measure, has become peaceful. She ought to be grateful to see life abounding, the oak leaves more vivid since the battle than a long time before, the return of birds and beasts and the retreat of spiders into the darker reaches of the forest, the white wood anemones under the beeches near Thranduil’s halls in spring, and the orc incursions from the north that have almost wholly ceased. She _is_ grateful. And still - it leaves Tauriel at a loose end. She briefly contemplates returning to the childhood acquaintance she had stayed with in the aftermath of the battle, delivering her the news of her parents’ death, and staying for the physical comforts both of them had been desperate for to shut out the pain. She knows that Sigilidh would open her door and and bed and herself again, but not even the thought of that seems right. It has been five years, and Tauriel has never felt herself so adrift. 

Maltheniel is still standing by her, her golden eyes filled with concern, and begins speaking softly the very moment Tauriel raises her head. “Tauriel, I think we must speak. You know the promise I made your mother, and I am not keeping it, nor do I know if I can. But I have an idea that may do you well.”

* * * 

The oar dips into the flood again, and Tauriel lets loose a breath as the boat shoots forward. She is sore from the unusual exertion, her back and shoulders protest every movement, but the current of the Anduin is swift and after the long slow trek westward through the forest with a caravan of traders bound for Eriador before winter comes, the ceaseless movement down the ribbon of the river is a relief. On the eastern shore, trees shoot past where the edge of Mirkwood draws near to the water, and long since the beeches of the north have given way to dark firs climbing the heights of the forest that fill her with hesitation, even some trepidation. She knows well that the south has an ill reputation, but after the White Council has ousted the evil from Dol Guldur, travelling is deemed safe again - and if she foregoes a night’s rest, she may arrive at her destination at daybreak rather than encamp in a region like this. 

She pushes the boat forward again, and lets her hand drag through the cool water. Maltheniel, she thinks, made her make the right choice. Her home has not felt like home for five years, her position as Captain of the Guard is not irreplaceable (although that thought stings at her pride a little, still), and now that her Queen has ordered she take a leave, there is little left but reluctant acceptance, at least until she feels the urge to return. And in truth, as un-eager as she is to leave, she is curious to walk under the golden trees of Lindórinand, which she has never seen, only heard wistful songs of, and stand face to face with the Lady of Light - for Maltheniel has assured her that the Galadhrim will not refuse her entry. That there is animosity between Thranduil and Galadriel is true and well-known, but Maltheniel also, not just Thranduil, knows Galadriel and Celeborn of long-ago in Doriath, and they parted in grace and friendship before the contact between their realms had ceased. 

Tauriel takes another deep breath, and lowers the oar into the current again, wondering what else will await her in the heart of the forest. 

* * *

Tauriel steals another glance at the untouched plate set to Galadriel’s left, eats a bite of the braised fish and herbs that Galadriel’s maidens have served, and finds, once again, that the Lady has an effortless way of commanding attention even doing something as mundane as dining while the sun is setting outside the windows of her _talan_ , scattering into golden light among the golden leaves, and painting a deep shine onto Galadriel’s hair. Tauriel remains bewildered that they invited her at all - but once again Maltheniel was right, and Tauriel suspects that aught she wrote into the letter she bade Tauriel deliver rendered her such kindness and honour. 

But the plate, untouched, and the meal on it slowly growing cold, continues to bewilder her - Tauriel knows that Galadriel and Celeborn had a daughter, but she departed over the sea after tragedy befell her - perhaps a ceremonial meal honouring her memory? She dares not ask, and hopes that this is not something Galadriel will read in her - she does not wish to bring her hosts grief, not at all, but certainly not within mere hours of her arrival. 

The dinner passes in silence, for the most part. The food is refreshing and the white wine wonderfully tart on her tongue, but Galadriel observes, after the plates have been cleared away, “You are weary, Tauriel, are you not? If you would rest, you shall be shown your lodgings, but it is early yet, and I would have you walk with me in my garden at the rising of the stars if you can bear such exertion. There is something I would ask you.”

Galadriel’s face is placid, but there is a twinkle in her lit-up eyes that makes Tauriel wonder if it was her way of a jest. Unlike Maltheniel, who seems young for all the years upon her, Galadriel seems grave and ancient, like one of the _mellyrn_ of her land, but sometimes there is joy in her like a sudden warm breeze through sunlit branches. 

Tauriel feels her mouth go dry at what might be expecting her, but murmurs agreement, and soon after finds herself descending the stair winding around the bole of the _mallorn_ that holds Galadriel and Celeborn’s abode. Next to Galadriel she feels like one of the willow-saplings planted in the earth of the battlefield. It is an odd, incongruous thing, especially in a land of peace like Lothlórien, where something has bespelled the very trees and stones into a breathless timelessness that her home utterly lacks, and she thinks she ought to feel at peace. Perhaps that will come in time. She wonders.

Galadriel glances back over her shoulder at Tauriel. “You feel the power of the land, then? That is good, and peace I think will come to you sooner than you think, if you do not force it. It is the way of Lothlórien itself to mend those who dwell here, and has always been so, but under my hand it lies like an island in the stream of time so that you may heal while you are safe from the currents and rapids that might else sweep you away.”

“I thought I had healed,” Tauriel responds in a low voice. Around Galadriel, any attempt at deception would be futile; the Lady’s powers, would see through it like through clear water - so it feels, at any rate. The idea that both truthfulness and silence will lay open her weaknesses gnaws at her. “I thought time would bring healing, but plainly I was mistaken.”

“You are young yet, Tauriel,” Galadriel replies. “And it takes time to understand that grief is always a change. It lives with you and alters you. In that sense there is no true healing from what you suffered, neither the deaths of your parents which may in time be relieved if you sail, nor that of Kíli son of Dís, and least of all for those of us who are bound to the circles of a world that is mortal. Healing comes from understanding your wounds and no longer letting their pain control your life, so that it may fade.”

When they reach the ground, they both have fallen silent and slip like shadows between the trees. Above them, like small, silver stars in the immense vault of the boughs, lamps kindle like a wave through the forest. Tauriel cannot help craning her head back when there is a level stretch of path ahead, and once she catches sight of Galadriel out of the corner of her eye, smiling softly, and can only imagine how young, how childish she must seem to be so fascinated by lamps, even if they are a semblance of stars. 

Ahead, where the trees of Caras Galadhon open southward like a gate onto a wide, hedge-enclosed sward, there is singing - a woman’s voice lifting to greet the rising of the Star, and Galadriel, stopping at the head of a flight of stairs, laughs softly. “I should have expected to find her here.”

Tauriel follows her gaze, and her breath catches. Among the winter roses abounding in the garden stands a woman, her face raised to the sky in song, herself shining like a star given elven form. Galadriel calls a soft greeting when the song ceases, “Undómiel, come meet our guest.”

Tauriel finally recognizes her - from tales, at least - as Arwen, the daughter of Elrond, fairest and likeness of Lúthien. It cannot, she thinks, be a lie. 

The woman turns laughing eyes upon them both, and bounds - barefoot, Tauriel notes with astonishment - toward them, up the stairs, her hands outstretched in greeting, clasping Tauriel’s against her breast when she is close enough. 

Arwen halts, and her fingers tighten around Tauriel’s, and the light of her eyes lingers and lingers on her face, as though there is something strange, enrapturing about her.

Then and there Tauriel thinks she wants to abide in Lothlórien forever, although part of her already recoils from the possibility of another wound.

* * * 

“... mother always hoped for me to take up arms. I did, finally, after my father’s death, joining the guard.” Tauriel feels herself smiling against the feeling of bittersweet recollection making her throat tight and her eyes sting, and looks down at the stone step they are sitting on, Arwen’s warm body near her, the thin, shimmering fabric of her dress rippling in a breath of wind. 

Galadriel has long since departed, but Arwen has not so much as let go of her hand for long, and does not, while Tauriel keeps talking, coming at last from her training to her mother’s death in service, too, and the necklace that she inherited as last reminder.

There is pain in Arwen’s eyes then, when she talks about Celebrían, her own mother, passing over the sea.

And it is then that Tauriel recognizes how Arwen seems to wholly lack her grandmother’s guile but none of her wisdom, and she is alive and _present_ \- gentle, animated, steadfast all at once - in a way that makes Tauriel’s heart flutter like a bowstring after the shot. If Arwen notes Tauriel’s melancholia at all, she says nothing of it, but her fingers, rough with needle callouses rather than the soft, unblemished digits Tauriel knows of Maltheniel and had assumed any royal woman would share, are hardly ever still, stroking Tauriel’s own, or lifting them to her lips to press a kiss to them as she talks, as though they were intimate friends rather than strangers. 

Strangers who have nonetheless been speaking in hushed, earnest tones for half the night, of Arwen and her family, of Lothlórien and Imladris and the choices that they represent to Arwen, and Tauriel’s history, of Mirkwood and her battles and her losses, woven into it. 

She is not sure what else to say for the moment, instead pouring from the pitcher of wine that Arwen had a servant bring, and hands her her glass, wondering if she can think of a blessing for the drink that they haven’t yet said. Arwen seems to think that they have moved beyond the need for that, simply lifts her glass to drink, a little greedily, and a drop of white wine pearls from the corner of her lips, leaving a trail down the side of her bright throat before it soaks into the neckline of her dress. In the gently cool air, her skin momentarily rises, and Tauriel, spellbound, feels heat flooding her cheeks at the thought of following that trail with her mouth, Arwen tilting her head back, and -- Tauriel gulps down half the contents of her own glass before the thought continues much further. 

Arwen tilts her head at her, a little quizzically. If Tauriel did not know better, she would consider it an invitation, but not so - not here where she is a stranger, not here where she finds herself falling, stupidly and implausibly after a few hours (but then, has she ever been different than to be so quick to fall?), for the granddaughter of her hosts, who has a higher fate than anyone Tauriel could hope to mingle with. They are as alike as their leather garb and silk dress, or needle and arrow. (Speaking about those likenesses later, Tauriel will recognize that both can pierce the skin.)

The feeling is not quite one of dismay, yet. Tauriel tells herself it is lust - that is easier to control than love, and when a pale pink flush heralds dawn coming into the eastern sky over the garden, Tauriel murmurs an apology for keeping Arwen awake and outside all night. 

Arwen laughs. “It was not a hardship to spend a night in pleasant conversation. We would be poor hosts here to not indulge a guest who has so recently arrived and is in need of reprieve from her cares.”

Tauriel is unsure how to reciprocate such easy grace and sits knotting her fingers, but Arwen solves that, too, pulling Tauriel to her feet with gentle strength. “Shall we walk past the roses before I show you your rooms?” 

The most Tauriel can do is not to blush fiercely when she nods.

* * * 

She dreams of Arwen amid the roses, then ascending the stairs of the _mallorn_ into its white branches and further into the sky, until she blazes as a star into the firmament and is gone. 

Tauriel wakes with her heart throbbing, in the dim light of her chamber. It is perhaps mid-morning judging by the light filtering through the screened window, but she feels oddly rested and her head is clear despite the few short hours of sleep and the carafe of wine they shared. What lingers from the past night is a feeling of uncouthness compared to Arwen, a sense of wildness and roughness that Lothlórien has not known in a long time. Her worries dissipate somewhat, when, having washed and dressed, she steps outside to explore the forest at her leisure. Caras Galadhon is brimming with people going about their business, and although she is a stranger, and cannot help noting the strange garb, the strange accent permeating their language, the many faces of undiluted Silvan descent, but Tauriel seems to attract no more notice than anyone, and revels in her anonymity where at home duty would dog her steps.

At last she finds a willow tree dipping its roots into the moat at the edge of the city and climbs it, then takes a rest there with her ear against the bole hidden underneath the trailing branches, drifting in her thoughts and the life of the tree from sapling to full growth, the same the willows on the battlefield will grow. It is the most peaceful she has felt in a while, much like the drifting current of the Anduin served to carry her away from her troubles. Recollection and remembrance, Arwen has said to her the past night, helped her come to terms with her own losses and those that may yet come, and Tauriel, who has always run and fought and loved until she was asleep on her feet, promised her to try it.

When she does, the only intrusion in her thoughts, of course, is Arwen. 

It is absurd, Tauriel tells herself. To fall in love - if it is that at all - so soon after Kíli - the recollection of his grinning face, his unfailing, unflinching joyousness, so unlike the people she has known and their burdens, that made even her skittish at times, the shared recklessness, the smooth round runestone in her hand and fingers folding over it - she dares not think further, but of course the memories rise to her mind unbidden after all, from barely below her conscious surface. 

It takes her time to compose herself. When Tauriel emerges from the willow it is growing near to dusk again, and the hour that she met Arwen the night before is not far ahead. Despite the dull ache in her head (she hopes there are no longer any outward signs of her tears) she makes her way to Galadriel’s garden once more, hoping to see Arwen’s bright figure among the roses again.  
That night, Arwen is clad in the blue of a summer sky. 

* * * 

“Even I know parts of the Lay of Leithian,” Tauriel says to her later that night while they are sitting on the stairs again, with a laugh that may be a little unsteady. The song has lost some of its lustre since Kíli’s death - him no Beren and her no Lúthien with the ability or the heroics to her name to move Badhon in his own halls and beseech the One to change her fate - but that makes the loss no less acute. More, rather, Tauriel thinks. 

But Arwen, she realizes, might have had that grace. She is one of the Half-elven. 

“Would you,” she asks, chiding herself in her mind for the way the question tightens her throat and the fact that she asks it still, “make Lúthien’s choice?” The dream from the past night comes to her mind again then, and Arwen looks at her out of luminous eyes that seem to catch the starlight. 

She makes no reply at first.

“It is too early to say,” she replies at last. “I may, perhaps, if the one I might come to love is mortal, and I must make it if I remain here when my father seeks the Havens, but there are great tidings and turmoils awaiting this world, and I cannot answer in ignorance of what is to come.”

Oddly, it does nothing to ease Tauriel’s mind. “You might forsake the world?”

“I angered you,” Arwen observes, and Tauriel replies with a twitch of her head, not quite a headshake.

“No,” she says. “Perhaps I am envious that it is possible for you.”

“Of the choice I must make?” 

“Five years ago I would have followed Kíli in a heartbeat. I thought my grief must break me, when just before I had thought the world was as open to me as I wished it to be, as long as I could fight.”

“You were a lot freer then than you are now, you mean to say?”

“I never quite understood why they called it the Lay of Leithian before,” Tauriel answers. “Release from Bondage. Before that I took being bound to the world as… permission, perhaps. I was content with memory and starlight, knowing that would in the end be what we all come to - and until then, to love and defend the world, ruthlessly if need be. But Kíli died regardless, and it no longer made any difference. Even the fight for vengeance failed me as it never did before.”

Like the night before, Arwen clasps her hand - and a little impulsively brings it back to her lips where Tauriel lets it linger even when Arwen’s own hands drop, before moving to cup her cheek and lean in, resting her forehead against Arwen’s, whose eyes close. 

“It makes a difference, still, Tauriel,” Arwen says, very softly. Her breath as she speaks puffs warm against Tauriel’s lips. “Do not let the bitterness of their Doom overcome you - the loss is harsh, but you still have this world and all within it, while they have the bliss promised to them when they pass on from Aulë’s halls - or so it is said, and why should we doubt it? We are not fools to disbelieve and fall. All is ordered as it must be, and you are a bright spirit of a kind I have seldom met. I would not see you darkened and will do all within my power to keep your light.”

For the Evenstar to say so - Tauriel lets silence linger between them after that. Only her hand curls into Arwen’s locks to keep her where she is - needlessly, perhaps, as Arwen does not attempt to pull away. Her words are not altogether a comfort to Tauriel, and they weigh like a stone on her heart, but she wonders if anything Arwen might have said would have made a difference then when her wounds are still so raw.

Perhaps not. 

But there is Arwen’s vivacity and concern and kindness, and there are Arwen’s shining eyes that enraptured Tauriel so the night before. Even if there is another farewell in her future - and Tauriel is indeed no fool to think there will not be, through her return home, or her remaining in the forest where her parents lie buried which she cannot see herself forsaking forever, while Arwen must leave at last if she means to live - that may be a farewell they may decide together. That may be healing - that, and their time together until then.

“Let me stay with you here,” she mouths, therefore, lowering her head so her lips touch Arwen’s, gently. 

“Yes,” Arwen replies, still no louder than a breath. “Abide with me, so that we may abound.”

**Author's Note:**

> Badhon: The Judge, the Sindarin name of Námo Mandos. 
> 
> This fic owes a lot to Vienna Teng's song [Abound](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjlOuXQZQmI).


End file.
